About a decade ago, I stopped using the word “pussy” to mean weak or timid. Not because the word itself is a “bad word” – I don’t believe in those, but I believe there are effective and ineffective ways of using words, just as there are also cruel or unhealthy ways and kind ways. There’s no problem with “pussy,” but the way it’s used it as an insult, a joke or a description of weakness just perpetuates un-free thinking about women. So it had to go.
It took me a while to give it up because, in our vernacular, it really rolls nicely off the tongue. It’s effective and, with the hard “P” sound at the beginning, there’s power right out of the gate. I’ve tried to replace it, testing out words like “wuss” or “pansie”, but let’s be real, if you’re trying to make an impact, whether for a good dig on someone or for a laugh, there’s nothing quite like “pussy.”
But there’s another word-usage that’s hit the chopping block – I am no longer going to use the word “dick” to describe someone who is somewhere on the spectrum between a jerk and pure evil. Just as I don’t want to perpetuate false stereotypes about women by using their genitalia as a synonym for weakness, it’s time to change my language so it no longer assumes a man’s anatomy is synonymous with him being a fucking dick. Okay. Now I’ll stop.
Winston Churchill said, “We shape our buildings and afterwards, they shape us.” This is even more true with language. We create language, adding new words to every-day use, well, almost every day. These words can set us free, giving us a greater understanding of things we didn’t know before, but they can also rob us of our freedom of thinking. If I say “Pussy” and you think of a schoolyard insult of weakness, then you are now captive of a way of thinking given to you by the meaning we’ve given to that word. Look above, I wrote “being a fucking dick” – and the image and meaning of that was automatic for most of us.
I want girls to grow up in a world where they can know their vagina/vulva is part of their strength and in turn, I want our boys to grow up in a world where their penis/testicles can be a part of their genuine love and compassion for humanity. How could our thinking about men and women change if a “pussy” is strong and brave and “dick” is ridiculously compassionate and loving? I’m ready to find out.
Image credits:
St. Francis: stmariagoretti.org/parish/st-francis-of-assisi-prayer/
Phallus vulva: urge.org
We Can Do It Woman: J. Howard Miller